What is the number one issue you find yourself running into when you try and lose weight?
Think about It before you read on.
Now, how could you approach things differently so this issue is not as disruptive to your goals?
You may have said you just can’t do It, or things just don’t work for you, or even that you don’t think you will ever get there.
Weight loss is one of the hardest goals to achieve within health and fitness. And I want you to know that you are NOT ALONE in this journey.
Here’s a quick piece from a Time Magazine publication:
“According to a March report from the World Obesity Atlas (WOA), more than half of the global population—51%, or over 4 billion people—will have obesity by 2035″
This is not overweight statistics, this is obesity. Over half of the world’s population. And a big portion of those people are ready to start their weight loss journey as well. Some of them have a good idea of where to start, others don’t. Some have done this before, others haven’t. Some will be successful, others won’t.
I want you to know that you CAN do It. I have seen people lose over 100lbs, 50lbs, 25lbs. All of whom said they just couldn’t do It. Well guess what, they did!
One of the first things most of us are told to do when we want to lose weight is to track our food (and I don’t disagree with this). Guess what, that doesn’t work for everyone. Sometimes tracking food can become obsessive (like we discussed in this post HERE) or just too overwhelming off the bat.
So how do you still lose weight without tracking your food?
#1: Portion Sizes
To lose weight we must consume less calories than we use. If you are not losing weight, you are doing the opposite (consuming more calories than you use). If you portion out slightly less food at each meal, you will consume less calories than you were the week prior.
You don’t need to weigh your meals or figure out how many ounces of chicken you made for dinner. What you need to do is be as aware as you can of how much food you are putting on your plate. You can think about your food on a size scale of your hand. Examples would be a full hand sized piece of chicken or a fist sized potato. This will give you a general idea of how big of portions you are having.
Now, when you want to try and cut back on those portion sizes you can do a 3/4 sized piece of chicken and a half fist sized potato. It doesn’t have to be exact but you will know just by looking at your plate how much of a difference this can make.
If you are someone who likes to have seconds when It comes to your meals. One way to cut back on portion size is to just have one plate and skip the seconds. For some people it’s that easy. Not for me though, I get in my head about second plates. My body feels like I need It in order to feel full (the psychological game of food is HARD). What you can do is tell yourself you will have a second plate, after you wait 10 minutes.
Sit at the table and talk to the people you are with. After the 10 minutes, if you are still hungry and eager for that second plate, go for It! Many times, that 10 minutes puts me in a place where I feel content with how much I’ve already eaten and I will pass on that second plate.
Controlling how much food enters your body is much harder when you are not fully aware of everything you eat. Be conscious of what goes on your plate. Be present while you eat. Be honest with your hunger and cravings.
#2: Snacking
Snacks are notoriously blah. The first thing that comes to mind when I think of snacks are things like chips, goldfish, and string cheese. They won’t give you a ton of benefit away from the taste and a quick jolt/dump of energy.
One of the ways you can see some great weight loss without having to change much else is to stick with only eating your 3-4 main meals each day. Cut out that mid-afternoon snack and that post dinner treat. The reason I like doing this is because those snacks are simply, as we said above, blah. Just like what we talked about above, those “snack” foods are made to give us a quick jolt of energy from something super tasty without giving us any lasting benefits. There are minimal health benefits away from the psychological satisfaction of having something engineered to be as palatable as possible.
If you are reducing the amount of total calories you are eating in a day, they shouldn’t be wasted on things that aren’t going to have any positive impact on your body. Now, if you are like me, taking out that mid afternoon snack is MUCH easier than the post dinner treat. I love treats, chocolate and ice cream are my good friends.
You don’t have to quit these things cold turkey. You can still eat your snacks if cutting them out is not working for you. Just make sure you are choosing things with more nutritional value. Things like fruits, nut butters (as long as you have self control, I feel like a fiend when peanut butter comes out), beef jerky, greek yogurt, vegetables, or nuts. Now if you want a real balanced snack, try a small portion of two different types of foods, like a protein + fat, or a carb + a protein. This could look like raspberries and greek yogurt; almonds and carrots, apples and almond butter, rice cakes and beef jerky.
If you are someone who has a sweet tooth after dinner, try something that takes care of that craving without crashing your calories for the day. For myself, I love a sweet treat after dinner. I used to have vanilla greek yogurt with some dried blueberries. I even put It in the freezer right before dinner where It has time to firm up just a tad and It is DELICIOUS. It also has a good amount of protein, a bit of healthy fat, and fruit. The greek yogurt tastes delicious, the dried blueberries have a sweet kick, and I felt more than satisfied of my craving after this each night.
These types of cravings are very normal when you start cutting back on calories. If you are eating in a way that fulfills your body throughout the day, these cravings should become less intense. So keep an eye on those cravings, if they begin to heighten It may be time to take a deeper look into the rest of your food.
#3: Alcohol
Alcohol is fun. It’s great to be able to hang out with friends and family, have a few drinks, and share some laughs.
You could cut It our completely and lose weight.
You can also drink every weekend and lose weight.
You could cut It out completely and gain weight.
You can also not drink a sip for the next few months, and gain weight.
Let’s go back to what we said at the beginning, you need to be taking in less calories than you use. Alcohol has calories (a good amount of them too). If you drink too much alcohol and It puts your calories over your maintenance, you will gain weight. If you plan your week, and drink an amount of alcohol that keeps you in a calorie deficit, you will lose weight.
When It comes to this topic, no amount of alcohol is “healthy”. There are no positive benefits, from a physical standpoint, that will come from drinking. But, It’s a part of our culture and something that us humans do on a regular basis.
Because alcohol has no positive benefit on your body, It is something you can cut out right now and see results. You can do the math on this as well. Take a look at your current week and add up what and how much alcohol you have on a weekly basis.
If you had a glass of wine with dinner two nights during the week and 5 beers throughout the weekend, the wine will have around 150 calories per glass and a light beer will be around 100-110. If you add those up for the week that will be 825 calories. Now take that number over the month and It is 3,580. To gain one pound of fat you need to consume 3,500 extra calories. So if you are eating enough food to maintain your weight and add this amount of alcohol on top of that, you could be looking at 1 pound of fat added every month just from alcohol. If you are eating below your maintenance calories, these liquid calories could be a road block for you to see that scale move in the right direction.
The point I am trying to make here is, if you are looking to lose weight without tracking food, alcohol is a simple place to start.
#4: Increase Your Protein Intake
Protein is very important when It comes to weight loss. For one, the amount of protein you eat will help build or maintain muscle from your workouts. This will help make sure that most of the weight you are losing is coming from FAT instead of MUSCLE.
Also, protein will help boost your metabolism. Not only from helping increase the amount of muscle on your body, but also due to how much more energy It takes to process and digest It.
Along with both things above, the protein you eat will help keep you feeling fuller, for longer. When you are in a calorie deficit, you are eating less food than you normally do. Your body is going to feel that. Hunger is a normal and expected feeling during this time but It doesn’t make It any less uncomfortable.
To help reduce that feeling of hunger, having enough protein at each meal will help you feel satiated for longer periods of time. There is a reason when I start working with people on a weight loss journey the main things we focus on are calories and protein– because protein is a HUGE piece to the puzzle.
When you are looking at your protein intake without tracking food, try to get a majority of each meal filled up from a protein source. If you are having a meal like ground beef, sweet potato, and brussel sprouts, fill up half your plate with ground beef, a quarter of your plate with the sweet potato, and the last quarter with brussel sprouts (don’t forget what we talked about in the portion size section).
Here is a list of some good protein sources:
- Ground beef
- Steak
- Chicken
- Turkey
- Wild caught salmon
- Shrimp
- Eggs
- Cottage cheese
- Greek yogurt
- Protein supplements
Now pick 3-4 options from the list above and those will be your protein sources for the week. Now, make sure you have a STRONG serving of one of them at every single meal for the entire week. A strong serving will look different for everyone and their protein needs, but somewhere between 25-50 grams of protein from one of these sources at every meal.
#5: Eat Fruit
No one has ever gained weight because they ate too much fruit. It kills me to read things that say you should stay away from fruit at the beginning your your weight loss journey to avoid the sugar.
Yes, fruit has sugar. No, your weight gain is not because you had those blueberries.
The reason I put fruit on this list is because if you eat more of It, in place of other foods, you will put yourself in a great spot to lose weight. Try replacing your “sides” and snacks with various fruits throughout the day. Don’t worry too much about how much you are having at each sitting. Eat your meal until your feel satisfied, then move on.
Think of things like breads, pastas, snack foods (chips, crackers). If you replace any one of those servings with a healthy portion of kiwi or berries you will not only feel full because of how much volume you are eating, you will most likely be eating FEWER calories.
Fruits are not as calorie dense as other foods. You can eat a good amount of them without overdoing It in that regard. A slice of sourdough bread will be around 130 calories (Pepperidge Farms sourdough slice). This doesn’t add the butter or toppings you want to put on it. 130 calories of blueberries is about a cup and a half to two cups. Anywhere from 130-170 blueberries. I would feel much more full on 150 blueberries than I would on one plain piece of bread. Take a look at your next few meals and see what you could replace with a strong serving of fruit. It WILL make a difference.
You do not need to track everything you eat or drink if you want to lose weight. These 5 tactics will help you lose weight. Even with the success food tracking has shown, it is not for everyone. Sometimes finding different ways to get the job done are the keys to success. What these tactics do require though is planning, consistency, and honesty for them to be effective.
Success becomes much easier when you have a plan. That plan will keep you on track, especially when things get tough (and they will). When the road begins to change, just check in on your plan and figure out your next step in the right direction.
Consistency is king and we hear this often. But the reason we hear It so often is because It’s true. If you follow one or more of these tactics for a week here and there, you won’t find the success you are looking for. Stick with It for a longer period of time and figure out how your progress has looked over that span. Think about how much more efficient you can be sticking to your plan for 3-4 months at a time instead of 3-4 weeks at a time.
Finally, honesty. You have to be honest with yourself. Does this work for you? Are you seeing true change? Without the objective measure food tracking provides, your honest thoughts on what and how much you are eating can make a big difference. Be as transparent as you can, especially when It comes to the food you eat.
In good health,
Jeff
